Stripes and Solids
by MagicFire
Summary: When Mione brings in a Muggle pool table, Draco wants to hustle her but needs a little help playing...DH one shot. For the Dramione Meaningless Fluffy First Kiss Shrine! Lol, thats' what I am calling it from now on. XD Please review!


Alright, a new one shot coming out for you guys. This one wasn't by request, but it is still dedicated to the Dramione Meaningless Fluffy First Kiss Series Shrine. Don't even ask…

Disclaimer: I do not own Harry Potter. And...I like Acid Pops. Ha ha. I am so dumb…and a little hyper right now, actually.

Anyway…

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"A billiard table?" Ron repeated as he eyed the table. 

"Not a billiard table, Ron. It's a _pool_ table. Muggle people play with these all the time." Hermione exclaimed as she racked the stripe and solid balls neatly in the center of the green felt. Ron rolled his eyes and he picked up a cue.

"Hey Harry," Ron began happily as he started spinning the cue like a baton then sticking it out in front of him. "I shall fight-eth you-eth for thy brunette maiden!" He joked. Harry laughed and grabbed a cue and began twirling it like Ron did.

"Well then prepare to eat-eth them word-eths!" Harry teased. The two began fencing with the cues.

"Guys! Guys cut it out! Somebody could get hurt!" Hermione barked.

"Yeah, I'm not taking sides or anything, but I bet Weasley will fall unwillingly to the ground is he's battling Potter." Malfoy spat, walking into the room nonchalantly.

"Ha, never thought I'd say this: Thanks Draco." Harry said, still trying to stab Ron with his cue.

"Like I said, I'm _not _taking sides. That is pathetic and low. Only Muggles play with pool tables." Draco replied sharply as he eyed the pool table Hermione had just finished setting up with disgust.

"Oh please, you're just saying that because you know if you were to hustle one of us three you'd loose!" Ron said looking at Draco slyly. Harry stabbed Ron in the stomach and watched as Ron choked and slapped down to the ground like a pancake.

"Ha! Thy have fallen to thy ground!" Harry paused. "I WIN!" He started dancing with the cue. "Go Harry, it's your birthday! Go Harry! Uh-huh! Yeah, go Harry!" He said.

"Shut up." Ron muttered as he got up off the ground and threw the cue, being stubborn and strutting out of the room. Harry stopped dancing.

"C'mon, Ron. I bet I can beat you at a wand fight, too!" Harry laughed throwing the cue at Hermione to catch and then following Ron out of the room. Hermione sighed with a roll of her eyes, murmuring something about them being 'immature'.

"I may not know how to play but I know I could so beat you at pool- even if it is a Muggle game." Draco snickered at Hermione. She had forgotten he was still in the room. She whipped her body around quickly to face the blonde Slytherin.

"Oh really?" She protested.

"Yeah, really." He retorted.

"I'd like to that happen." She mocked. "But you don't even know how to play." Hermione reminded him. Draco shrugged grabbing the cue Ron had thrown on the ground.

"You're right, I do not." He said tossing the cue hand from hand.

"Please, I like _real _competition." She scoffed, leaning on the pool table and straightening up the rack of pool balls that had tilted a little out of place.

"Then teach me."

"Excuse me?" Hermione replied.

"Well, I like a real challenge in a game, too. Besides, I don't think I'll get too far playing pool Potter and Weasley style." He explained.

"And you think you could get far the real way to play?" She asked him trying to sound serious about the situation. She kept on trying to keep her cool. Draco seemed to do a perfect job of being monotone and relaxed in a stiff way, like Hermione was trying to be.

"No, maybe not. But I could definitely hustle some Slytherins for money." Draco replied. Hermione scoffed in cynic. 'As long as it isn't me he's hustling.' She thought, knowing he wouldn't, but just to reassure herself in case he did try to in the future, anyway.

"Fine." Draco looked at her in surprise. "Guess you didn't think I was going to actually teach you, now did you, Malfoy?" She smirked. Draco shrugged with a little smile. "Good, then let us play." She told him.

After fifteen or twenty minutes, Malfoy finally started to get the hang of the Muggle game. Hermione began to wonder why he was acting such like a pacifist. Not really acting like he was trying to play to defeat her. More like just play to learn. But it wasn't like he was acting dumb, it was just he kept on getting distracted by how pointless the game seemed to him. He kept asking her questions, too. Like why Muggles would use a stick to push a hard ball when you could just be using your hand with more force and accuracy. Hermione had to admit Malfoy had a point, but she kept explaining that the rules indicate that you have to use a cue stick.

Now Granger was just directing him to put his practicality aside and how to handle the cue comfortably and correctly. The two were standing on opposite sides of the pool table. Hermione couldn't help but chuckle when he began holding the cue wrong and hit one of her stripe pool balls instead of his solid ones. She strode over to his side of the table. "Here, you have to put your finger over like this…" she showed him by sliding her finger and hand back and forth a few times. Draco nodded, saying nothing.

He tried to mimic her doing but was doing even worse now. He angrily slammed his fist down on the table's side in frustration. Hermione chuckled again. "Here," she said moving behind him and putting her hands over his own on the cue stick, so now her arms were resting lightly around his whole body. Hermione flushed and was relieved he didn't see her blush at him. She was being nervous ever since they had started the game and now that she had her arms wrapped around his waist she was being even more nervous. She felt like the humidity of the room had raised.

But even as she was tangled inside and in a knot and was nervous, he was still just standing there perfect, not _one_ strip of blonde hair out of place. Hermione realized her mistake as soon as she found that she had to put his arms around Malfoy to reach his hands on the cue. She moved a little to the side, trying to minimize contact between them. Swallowing hard and trying to keep her voice steady, she muttered instructions to him as she showed him how to move.

She pressed down on his back slightly, so that he was leaning correctly over the table, and tried to ignore the way his hip pushed into her thigh. She positioned his index finger over the tip of the cue, her breath catching when she felt the smooth, soft skin. Hermione cursed at herself silently thinking that she was being so pathetic and 'unprofessional'. 'I do not like him and he doesn't like me…I do not like him and he doesn't like me. I do not like him and he doesn't like me…' She repeated in her mind quickly, trying to brainwash herself.

It didn't work, apparently.

She took hold of his other hand, toward the base of the cue, and showed him how to draw it back smoothly and slide it forward. After a few practice shots, she gathered her composure and drew away from him. "Practice time over." She said gathering all the pool balls and fixing them neatly in the center of the green felt table once again. Draco looked at her with uncertainty.

"You've…you've got it now," she assured him, smiling a little shakily as she took the rack off the balls and motioned to the end of the table. "Now, do you remember when I told you about 'breaking?'" He nodded seriously and moved to the spot she pointed to, subconsciously running a finger lightly over the hand that he had been holding moments before. He exhaled in concentration and bent over the table, just as she had shown him. He held the base of the cue and drew his elbow straight back, securing the end on the table using a curled finger. Hermione placed the white ball directly in front of the tip of his cue and leaned over the table, watching him and waiting. He took a deep breath, closed his eyes, and moved the cue forward. He heard it knock the cue ball forward, and then he heard a series of clicks and clacks as it broke the other balls' formation and sent them off in every direction. He opened his eyes just in time to see a single ball, the green solid one, roll into the corner pocket.

"Successful?" He asked her single-worded. She could only nod, her throat dry and scratchy. "So…it's over now?" He asked her. She shook her head with a little giggle in his dumbfounded ness.

"You- You have to get all the solid balls into the pockets before I get all of my stripe balls into the pockets." She stuttered, her voice still a little ripped. Draco began to notice her new face features. How nervous she just looked. Her hair was looking tangled and frazzled. Draco took in her flushed cheeks, slightly rumpled hair, and those chocolate eyes looking embarrassed and hollow. On a sudden impulse, he reached behind her head and pulled her down for a kiss.

"Hermione! Hermione! Guess what! Ron and I were having a wand fight and I won- again!" Harry exclaimed in triumph, running into the room that Draco was kissing Hermione in.

"Guys! HELLO!" Draco pulled back quickly and let go of his embrace on her. Hermione looked at him. Then Harry. Then back to him.

"Uhh…this can all be explained…" Hermione began. Harry just walked out of the room again say nothing with a stiff posture and a void look on his face.

Hermione cleared her throat letting out a peep, again unable to speak. Draco looked at her in surprise. "What an informative lesson…" He drifted off. She nodded looking up at him with a small gasp with a sly smile to follow.

For once that whole time, one small blonde strand was out of place and hovering over his gray eyes. She giggled. Draco looked at her with a raised eyebrow in curiosity.

"Anything the matter?" He asked slowly looking very confused.

"Oh, it's nothing, really."

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A/n: The end! Hope you liked it. I got the title from somebody else and the idea of this one shot, but my one shot is nothing like the other author's, trust me. But I did have an idea like this one involving a pool table before, so not so much unoriginal. And I really hope you liked it and review because I had to ask a lot of people and look up a ton of stuff about playing pool. I was as clueless as Malfoy in the beginning. 

But this really does reflect my life. I love real competition, I did need somebody to help me play, I did wonder why we use sticks instead of our hands which are better, I did fence with my friend with the cue sticks one time, and I do think about hustling my friends like Draco.

Please review!

Love,  
MagicFire


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